This invention relates to a reusable and conveniently cleanable and transportable fatigue reducing foldable floor mat that is well-suited for use in a wide variety of industrial, healthcare, food service, and similar applications.
In the various pertinent industries, including for purposes of illustration but not limitation, food service and medical professional applications, those with skill in the art have long-recognized the need for various fatigue reducing devices, such as cushioned floor mats. In the noted examples of the food and medical industries, chefs and surgeons alike have suffered from seriously debilitating maladies of the back and legs resulting from their long hours spent standing. Many prior art attempts have been made to minimize such fatigue for purposes of mitigating the painful consequences of standing for long periods of time.
For example, attempts have been made to create floor mats adapted to facilitate fluid drainage, as in U.S. Pat. No. 3,802,144 to Spica, while others were more directed towards developing well-padded surfaces as in U.S. Pat. No. 3,846,945 to Roby, which among other features, purports to offer a fatigue relief capability. Devices such as the Roby floor mat have also sought to teach multi-paneled mat arrangements having panel-to-panel interconnection capabilities. Additional multi-panel configurations are illustrated, along with other various features, in U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,167,599 to Nissinen, 4,468,910 to Morrison, and U.S. Pat. No. 5,275,502 to Glaza et al. Yet other prior floor mats have attempted to improve the field of art by focusing on improved traction, in addition to previous features, such as in U.S. Pat. No. 4,596,729 to Morrison, and U.S. Pat. No. 5,815,995 to Adam. And, still others aimed to improve the liquid and debris collection capability of foldable floor mats. See, for example, U.S. Pat. No. 4,940,620 to Silk et al. for a food collection mat for high-chairs and U.S. Pat. No. 5,173,346 to Middleton for a sponge floor mat for surgical applications.
What continues to be missing from the technical field of floor mats is a solution to the need for ease of introduction to the work place or station, easy cleaning after work is completed, and convenience of storage and transport after cleaning. While many of the prior art devices aimed to improve these attributes in the art of such mats, none has achieved an optimized capability in an easy to fabricate, convenient to use form that is readily suited to application in the myriad industries that have demonstrated a need for portable, easy-to-clean, and convenient to transport and stow floor mats.
What has been needed but heretofor unavailable in the prior art devices and methods, is a floor mat that is adapted to low-cost, high volume manufacturing techniques and processes. Also, what continues to be needed is a foldable, fatigue-reducing, and traction improving floor mat that is easily deployed for use, and that is compatible for cleaning with widely available and well-entrenched industry cleaning equipment, including commercial and food service dish washers and medical poison gas and steam heat autoclaves. Moreover, such a preferred floor mat must also offer convenient transport and stowage that improves upon the currently available rolled and folded mats, while still maintaining the preceding preferred and long-sought capabilities.
The most preferable folding floor mat would be compatible for use in wide-ranging industrial applications involving standing for long periods of time, as well as professional industries such as food preparation services and surgical applications, among many other situations that require long duration standing activities.
The present invention meets these and other needs without adding any complexity, inefficiencies, or significant costs to implementation in existing applications and environments. In fact, the preferred folding floor mat according to the present invention can be implemented with relatively low-cost modifications to existing floor mat fabrication equipment and methods. The various embodiments of the present invention disclosed are readily adapted for ease of manufacture, low fabrication costs, and immediate compatibility with both the most widely available and installed manufacturing and cleaning equipment used in the previously described industries, as well as similar equipment that may subsequently become available.
In its most general capacity, the present invention injects a variety of new capabilities into the field and overcomes many of the shortcomings of the prior art in a variety of ways. In one of the many preferable configurations, the folding floor mat according to the present invention includes, among other elements, a plurality of panels, for example, 2, 3, 4, or more panels that are preferably formed from a resilient polymeric material such as a thermoplastic. The more favored floor mat of the instant invention incorporates panels that are substantially planar and formed to have a work surface that is configured to support a worker and a grip surface that includes features for optimized application to a flooring surface.
Additionally, the present invention contemplates the floor mat having a flexible hinge assembly adapted to foldably join together the panels along a respective fold boundary disposed between adjacent panels. More preferably, the hinge assemblies are formed from or incorporate at least two channels that are integrally formed in the work and grip surfaces proximate to the fold boundary. The channels are generally spaced apart from one another and are shaped to have a profile that is selected for the capability to relieve internal stresses in the polymeric material when the panels are folded together.
In variations of the preceding configurations, the polymeric material of the folding floor mat is selected to be a resilient, flexible, and durable material that resists abrasion wear and that can withstand exposure to severe and deleterious fluids and substances, such as, without limitation, biological, food service, health care, and industrial fluids and substances. Some such exemplary substances and fluids include steam, high temperature water, cleaning fluids, petrochemicals, animal fats, biological fluids, cooking oils and greases, bacteria, fungi, insects, pests, and raw and prepared agricultural food stuffs, to name a few.
More specifically, any of the preceding embodiments may include panels and hinge assemblies preferably formed from polymeric material that is selected from the group including thermoplastics, thermoformed plastics, thermoset plastics, elastomers, grease-resistant rubbers, vinyls, polyvinyl chlorides, acetal resins, delrin, fluorocarbons, polyesters, polyester elastomers, metallocenes, polyamides, nylon, polybutadienes, silicone resins, ABS (acrylonitrile, butadiene, styrene), polypropylenes, liquid crystal polymers, and combinations, composites, mixtures, admixtures, alloys, laminates, reinforced compositions, and hybrids thereof.
In alternative configurations of one or more of the previously described embodiments, the hinge assemblies are formed to have a minimum cross-sectional thickness to optimize durability while facilitating foldability. This capability is achieved from configurations wherein the polymeric material proximate to the fold boundary is formed with a minimum cross-sectional thickness of between about 10% and about 70% or so of the maximum total thickness of the mat between the work and grip surfaces. Even more preferably, any of the preceding configurations are formed whereby the polymeric material has a minimum cross sectional boundary thickness of between approximately 30% and approximately 60% of such maximum mat thickness.
In yet other alternatives and modifications to the previously illustrated exemplary configurations, the folding floor mat of the instant invention incorporates hinge assemblies formed from, among other features, channels that are formed with a cross sectional profile that improves the stress relieving function of the hinge assembly. It has been found that certain types of such profiles are effective for this purpose and include, for purposes of illustration but not limitation, curvilinear such as concave and convex, rectilinear, rectangular, and trapezial profiles.
The preferred floor mat hinge assemblies have also been further modified in other alternatives of the various preceding embodiments with enhanced durability and ability to fold capabilities by arranging the channels that are formed in the work surface to be generally offset or staggered relative to the channels that are formed in the underlying grip surface.
Further optional variations of the preceding modifications also include work and grip surfaces that are also formed to have stipple and or dimple patterns of raised portions. More preferably, the raised portions formed on the grip surface are arranged to project generally downwardly and are adapted to establish fluid passageways by raising areas of the grip surface above an underlying floor surface. Similarly, such projections are further adapted to improve traction against the floor surface to maximize the anti-skid capability of the mat as it lies on the floor during use. In an analogous manner, the raised portions of the work surface are adapted as traction ridges that project generally upwardly to improve the anti-skid capability of the mat as it performs in use by a worker.
In another preferred variation of the preceding embodiments, the folding floor mat according to the instant invention incorporates four quarter panels arranged generally in the shape of a rectangle. As with preceding configurations, the panels are similarly formed from a resilient polymeric material and to have work and grip surfaces. The panels also include flexible hinge assemblies that are integrally formed in the polymeric material of the panels and hinges are adapted to foldably join the quarter panels along at least three fold boundaries. Also, at least two of the four panels preferably define an interstice therebetween to further facilitate foldability, among other benefits. In further optional modifications of the preceding embodiments, this configuration can also be adapted to incorporate hinge assemblies formed with channels formed in the work and grip surfaces about the fold boundaries and spaced apart and staggered as described earlier. Even more preferably, the offset or staggered channels are formed as two or more stress relief notches formed in the boundary of the work surface, and three or more stress relief notches formed in the grip surface boundaries.